


Lines in the Sand

by acestriker



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Attempted Seduction, Awkward Sexual Situations, Communication Failure, Leadership, M/M, Surprise Kissing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-26
Updated: 2017-09-26
Packaged: 2019-01-05 13:59:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12191301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acestriker/pseuds/acestriker
Summary: After a failed battle, Keith goes to Shiro for comfort. Unfortunately, the kind of comfort he wants isn't the kind Shiro can give him. Things get awkward, and nobody is happy.





	Lines in the Sand

**Author's Note:**

> I feel I need to apologize for this I'm sorry

Sometimes in war, you needed to be prepared to take a loss or two. To gain everything you had to be prepared to risk everything, and sometimes failure was exactly what you needed to turn things around and come back stronger the second time. ... That was what Shiro kept telling himself, anyway. He wasn’t sure if it was sticking right now, but he needed it to; he needed to be a pillar of calm and strength, to hold everyone together, so they wouldn’t fall apart.

If only there were someone to hold _him_ together.

What had started as a standard hit and run mission had escalated into full-blown combat, and the Galra were getting smarter at exploiting their weaknesses, at making sure they couldn’t get away. The particular creation they’d sent had put them so on the defensive that forming Voltron hadn’t been possible, and everyone sustained heavy damage. Lance got the worst of it after literally shoving Keith out of the way after he recklessly tried to take the brunt of an attack that could have killed him, and Pidge and Hunk had taken similar hits in the aftermath. Keith and Shiro were both scraped, bruised and exhausted beyond measure themselves, but there were too few people to let _everyone_ in the cryopods. They’d decided to let everyone else rest while they powered through the aches and the humiliation and anger to help repair the castle. Even if they did rest, the work took precedence; if the Galra found them again in this state, they would all unquestionably die. They had to get everything operational and lay low as possible before they could even think about treating their injuries.

Shiro hated knowing that he had probably gotten the least hurt when his head screamed at him, when he was so overexerted that his vision always seemed to swim if he didn’t focus as hard as he could. And there was so much to be done they couldn’t even sleep; they got in a three hour nap a day, if anything. After the third day, Coran insisted they’d helped enough, but the sudden free time was gut-wrenching when he knew that Pidge, Lance, and Hunk were still healing. The most useful thing he could have done for himself was sleep, but he wasn’t sure he knew how when their abject failure pressed down on him like this, and he was sure that Keith and Coran and Allura were feeling the same way. He had to keep it together, keep his head held high for them, and make sure he could still be smiling when the others woke up. They _needed_ him to be their strength right now.

For the moment, though, he sat alone in his room, letting the mask of leadership crumble where nobody could see. There were certain lines that needed to be drawn when you led a group like this, and those entailed not exposing too much weakness, not compromising your integrity. He was the force binding them together, and if he cracked, the whole structure of their team would collapse. But Shiro wasn’t so stupid to think that he wasn’t allowed to feel pain, either, so he let it wash over him where he could still cope with it in private. He let himself try to breathe through the agony, to deal with it and compartmentalize it, lock it away so that he could be as strong for everyone as they needed. As _he_ needed. Because even if the loss hurt, deep down he knew it would hurt even more to fail his teammates when they needed him.

A knock at his door pulled him out of his thoughts, and he was honestly a little dismayed. It was jarring being interrupted when he hadn’t let himself finish thinking quite yet, but then, maybe he’d thought _too_ much. Maybe it would be nice to have something redirect his focus again. He opened the door, a little torn between gratefulness and unease.

“Keith?” he answered with a frown. “You should be resting.” It’d help with the pain; with the wounds and all the distress. But he couldn’t fault Keith for it when he was hardly feeling up to sleeping himself, even with the multiple forms of exhaustion.

“I... wanted to talk to you,” Keith explained, biting his lip. He could barely even look Shiro in the eyes. “I can come back later.”

It was timid in a way that wasn’t like Keith, like he was bothering him somehow, and Shiro’s heart clenched. He could tell how emotionally defeated he must be feeling, and he couldn’t send him away in that state. He tried to smile, as warmly as he could, given the circumstances. “Come in,” he invited. “I could use the company.” And he could—maybe by helping Keith he could also help himself in the process.

“... Okay,” Keith mumbled. He stepped in and let the door close behind him, leaning against it in thought. Shiro remained silent, knowing that if Keith wanted to say something, he’d say it. He wasn’t someone he could force; if you pushed Keith, he pushed back harder. “Shiro. The thing is, I...”

“Keith?” he encouraged gently. Keith seemed to be having trouble getting the words out, and Shiro could more than understand why. He was hurting, everyone was, and something like that could be hard to admit, even after such a huge loss. Shiro honestly wasn’t sure if he could say what Keith needed him to say, but he’d try as hard as he could to be there for him.

But what came next really wasn’t the conversation Shiro had been anticipating. Keith made his way across room in silence, staring at Shiro in frustration and deliberation. His lips moved like he wanted to say something, but he didn’t know how, and then, in sudden resolution, he leaned forward, forcefully pressing their mouths together. Shiro could feel his whole brain short-circuit, too shocked to even know how to respond, and Keith, determined not to give him the chance, kept going, kissing him with all the firmness and aggression he could manage, trying to pull Shiro’s lower lip into his mouth. When Shiro exhaled in surprise, Keith took the opportunity to slide his tongue into his mouth.

Shiro honestly didn’t know what to make of all this. He should have been angry that Keith was kissing him without his permission, but his body didn’t seem to know how to protest, even seemed to melt into it, and though he wasn’t quite reciprocating the kisses, he as surprised to find a certain warmth spreading over him, and realized that he wanted this so, so badly. Keith’s kisses were fervent, designed to keep him from talking, and he held onto him tightly, trying to keep their bodies pressed together like Shiro would disappear if they lost that contact. Somehow Keith managed to get Shiro’s shirt untucked from his pants and slid his wandering hands up his torso, caressing circles into his skin, and Shiro shuddered at how warm the touches were. His brain was starting to go hazy, and all he could think about was fucking Keith into his mattress until they couldn’t move anymore.

... But that wouldn’t be right.

“Keith,” Shiro exhaled, trying to pull away, but Keith closed the gap between them again. It was hard to maintain control like this. Everything he did was clumsy and inexperienced, but the suddenness of it and the reckless abandonment Keith put into every touch kept sucking Shiro back in, making him want even more of him. And it was strange, because Shiro had always been so careful about keeping firm boundaries as a leader that he never quite realized just _how much_ Keith did to him, until now, when it was threatening to finally boil over. It took every single drop of self-control Shiro had to finally rest his hands on Keith’s shoulders, carefully pushing him back to get a more healthy distance between them.

“Keith,” he said, more firmly this time. “ _Cool it._ ”

“Shiro... I need this,” Keith pleaded, his voice almost cracking. “Please.”

“I said cool it,” Shiro repeated. This was no longer the voice of a friend, it was of a leader making an order, and Keith shrank back as if he’d been hit. He _hated_ doing this, but he couldn’t let things proceed the way they had been. “Keith, listen to me,” he said, considerably more gently. “I promise you this isn’t what you want.”

“It is, though,” Keith told him. “I just... realized that I can’t wait any longer.”

Shiro sighed. The haziness from earlier was lifting, and he was starting to regain his senses, and with it, awareness of how exhausted he really was, how exhausted _Keith_ must have been. They were both emotionally fried. It’d be so easy to surrender control and just do whatever they wanted, but that wouldn’t actually make them feel better, in the long run. They’d feel good for tonight and then be left with nothing but aches and regret, and though on some level he wondered if he’d wanted the same thing longer than he’d realized, he couldn’t let it happen this way.

“Keith... You’re tired and hurting. We all are,” Shiro reasoned. “If we did it like this, I’d only be taking advantage of you, and I can’t do that. You can’t just... jump into bed with someone because you’re scared. It doesn’t work like that.”

“Why not?” Keith protested.

“Because I respect you too much to use you—or to let you use me,” he responded firmly. “And the fact that you haven’t considered how I might feel about this tells me loud and clear that you aren’t doing this for the right reasons. Have you thought about what I want? This isn’t how I envisioned things going down. ... You deserve better than this. We both do.”

“I... You’re right,” Keith breathed, shaking his head. “I should have just talked to you. You... probably never wanted that from me, anyway. ... I’m sorry.”

If only Keith could realize how badly Shiro _did_ want it. But he couldn’t exactly tell him that now, so he settled instead for closing the gap between them, pressing their foreheads together and savoring in Keith’s warmth in the significantly less charged contact. This much was fine; it didn’t quite cross the edge of what would be appropriate for them.

“Keith,” he said softly. “Give yourself some time. A day, a week, or even a month. But you have to rest and calm down. If you still want it after that, I’ll be here. Otherwise, we’ll just pretend this never happened.” Although honestly, Shiro had a sinking feeling Keith would never call him out again, that he only wanted it now out of sheer desperation. Which was all the more reason to not let it happen right now. Yet he was also distantly aware he was giving his friend permission to sleep with him at a later date, which was a promise he might not actually be able to keep. ... This was really turning into a mess.

“Alright,” Keith agreed. The walls were going back up, protecting and concealing the desperation he was feeling, but Shiro could still see the rejection in his eyes, and his stomach sank. “... I’m sorry to bother you. I’ll be going now.”

“You’re not,” Shiro told him honestly. “I’m not angry. Don’t worry about me and just focus on yourself for now, alright?”

Keith gave a weak nod and left, leaving Shiro to sink down into his bed in misery. Logically, he knew he did the right thing here, but somehow he couldn’t escape the feeling that he’d just done something awful. It didn’t feel good rejecting his friend like that no matter how he tried to rationalize it, no matter how much he knew there was no other choice. He wished he could make it up to him somehow, but... boundaries. They needed space so they didn’t end up doing something stupid, and if this happened again, Shiro wasn’t sure he’d be able to hold back. ... He couldn’t let that happen.

Maybe it was time to sleep after all. Tomorrow, they could finally wake everyone up, and he could focus on them instead for a little while. Get everything stabilized, get everyone’s emotions back in check. Not have to deal with the little voice in the back of his head that kept telling him that he really did want to ravage his best friend, despite how inappropriate that would be for both them and the team.

He just hoped he’d be able to look at Keith the same way in the morning. They were going to need it.

 


End file.
